Maybe it’s ADD. I used to think in in long, carefully-crafted, almost legalistic arguments. Now I think in plosives. Like this one.

I make no claims for the following as carefully-reasoned political discourse. It’s more like a hunch or an instinct.

Whenever Proxident Bush— I can’t bring myself to call him “President”; it just feels wrong, like calling Scott Bakula “Captain”— anyway, whenever he talks about his vision of an “Ownership Society,” this line from Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” comes to mind:

When you got nothin’, you got nothin’ to lose.

Conversely, when you got sumpin’, you do got sumpin’ to lose — and you fear losing it — and that’s what the Proxident’s “Ownership Society” is really about: making sure every American has a stake in the status quo, a vested interest in the well-being of large corporations, and therefore a reason to vote Republican.

You probably know the old adage: “If you owe the bank a thousand dollars, the bank owns you. If you owe the bank a billion dollars, you own the bank.” Well, we all know people who are owned by their possessions, and that, too, is at the heart of the “Ownership Society” concept. If you own a billion shares, you own the corporation. If your net worth is based on a few thousand shares, your continued existence becomes contingent on the corporation’s profitability. In a very real sense, the corporation owns you.

So let’s call this “Ownership Society” idea what it is: The Republican Dream. Every American a slave to corporate interests. Sort of a Middle Passage for the middle class.

Which brings to mind this tidbit from the same song:

Ain’t it hard when you discover that
He really wasn’t where it’s at,
After he took from you everything he could steal?

Oh! No, wait! I’m sorry — that’s the Proxident’s plan for Social Security. Another discussion for another time.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 5th, 2005 at 11:42 PM and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.